Tuesday, August 16, 2011

You muffed it, Warren Buffett.

An Op-Ed piece by Warren Buffett has been published in the New York Times this week in which he advocates for higher taxes on rich people like himself.

As others have pointed out, he can donate all he wants to the federal government, but all he does by pushing this Obama theme is increase the likelihood that taxes will be raised on people like you and me.

Because, as has amply been pointed out by others, the federal government could confiscate all the wealth of the Warren Buffetts of the world and not make a dent in the deficit.

It's all about cash flow. Progressives (and the faux Republicans who enable them) do not care about our balance sheet. They care only about keeping the money flowing to special interests and voter blocs, many of whom pay no income tax at all. And it is through the middle class where most of the cash flows because, at least for now, there are so many of us and we're the ones who pay the lion's share of the taxes in terms of dollars if not percentages.

It's the middle class that those who want to raise taxes are after, not the Warren Buffetts of the world. Warren Buffett suffers from the same malady that attacks many suddenly rich celebrities and children of the rich: wealth-guilt. They realize that they have just been luckier than most, so they try to look generous by carrying the banner for redistributing other people's wealth.

Warren Buffett would serve society better by putting pressure on Obama and the whole Washington class to curtail their spending, a la the head of Starbucks. But if he can't do that, then I suggest he do this: